Overblown reaction to terrorism

I have long thought that we waste a lot of time and energy fighting terrorism, which is probably one of the end goals of terrorists in the first place.  Reading the reactions to the attempted bombing on Christmas day is amazing.  http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/12/29/airline.terror.obama/index.html?eref=igoogle_cnn

The basic view of politicians and many Americans is:  "Let's spend all the money we can and prevent 100% of all terrorist acts."  I really want to know why the overreaction.  Trying to prevent 100% of anything is a near impossible task.  A more reasonable approach would be to try and prevent 80% of all attacks.  This is much cheaper, more realistic, and doesn't cripple our systems.  Besides, if the end result is to prevent American deaths, then there are areas where our money would be better spent.  Car accidents still account for 30k American deaths each year yet we do not throw our resources into that.  We are still wasting billions of dollars going after a cause of death that in the last ten years has claimed 3,000 lives.  That is 1% of the car accident death total over the same period.  In addition, the worst case scenario in this most recent attempt would have been the sum total of the passengers and crew on the one air plane.  300 people or so.  Sometimes we have to be ok with casualties in order to run an efficient and intelligent system.

What other goals might we have in mind:
- The vague notion of protecting America's borders.  If 1000 American's die this month in car accidents, it doesn't make are borders unsafe.  If a foreigner kills 300 people, somehow that indicates that we are close to being invaded?

- We must prevent terrorism:  This isn't an end goal.  It is an ideal with no real purpose.

- Airplanes must be safe:  Why?  As long as they are really really really safe, as they are now, and they would be even with a couple planes being blown up every year, I still think they would qualify as really safe.

- We must protect the airline industry:  Again, why?  Any industry that needs protection should probably be dismantled anyway.  Maybe we'd come up with something better if we weren't babying the airlines all the time.

Bill Simmons Interviews Tiger Woods

Bill Simmons is by far my favorite sports writer.  His contribution to the whole Tiger Woods disaster, reposting a like to an old interview with Tiger.  Pretty good read.

Wine Snobs are a Fake

Just read an article on wine tasting pointed out by TMQ from ESPN.com.  The article from the Wall Street Journal reports on research done on Wine Tasting Judges over the years.  Very interesting.  The bottom line:  Wine snobs are a fake and you should never fell "not good enough" to enjoy wine.  Drink it and buy wine that is less than $10 a bottle.  The article basically says that you have a 1 in 5 chance of getting a really good wine whether you're spending $5, or $100.  Spend $10 and enjoy your wine.

Good Quote

Saying what we think gives us a wider conversational range than saying what we know.
  - Cullen Hightower